from Kevin Paul Dupont of the Boston Globe,

This is the busy season for former Bruins center Adam Oates, darting across North America for the better part of 90 days, June through August, to work one-on-one with his 50-plus NHL player/clients as the game’s consummate Mr. Fix It.

Oates, 56, hung out his shingle four years ago as sole proprietor of Oates Sports Group, dedicated to enhancing his clients’ skill level, particularly their offensive production. Results have been strong.

According to Oates, 37 of his players reached career-high point totals last season, including Ryan O’Reilly. The Blues pivot posted personal bests in assists and points, then opened a postseason hardware store by winning the Conn Smythe as playoff MVP for the Cup-winning Blues and added the Selke as the NHL’s top defensive forward.

“I love the life,” said Oates, inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2012, and today ranking 18th all time in NHL scoring (1,420 points). “I love working with the guys.”

There is, as Oates calls it, a “secret sauce” to what he teaches, and it’s no surprise he protects the recipe.

“You go to McDonald’s for a Big Mac . . . you pay for it, they hand you one, right?” he mused recently when reached on the road in Minnesota. “They don’t tell you what goes into the sauce.”

It has long been a mystery here why NHL teams, for all the training and coaching methods they’ve devised and embraced over the last 30 years, haven’t carved out space for a scoring coach the way, say, baseball teams have added hitting coaches.

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